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Harlequin Intrigue May 2021--Box Set 2 of 2

Page 30

by Carol Ericson


  She couldn’t say she was surprised Reece didn’t like the idea, but she was surprised at the...immensity of his conviction. Vehemence pumped off him, barely restrained. He’d begun to pace, something she’d never seen him do.

  He’d always been kind and gentle and contained. Even when he’d picked her up and carried her to his car. He’d been certain and determined but not...

  Impassioned.

  “Lianna.” Reece’s entire demeanor changed. He took a deep breath and then spoke to her in a calm, authoritative manner. “You’ve had a long day. You should rest. We’ll handle all this, since it’s our fault you’re a target in the first place.”

  Maybe he’d transferred his fury to her, because it leaped up, hot and reckless. “You will not dismiss me.”

  “That’s not—”

  “That’s exactly what you’re trying to do. And sure, if you want to point fingers, your little group holds some of the blame, but my home was bugged. Clearly whatever Todd was involved in wasn’t done with me yet, even if they’d let me be. That isn’t your fault. It’s Todd’s.”

  “How do you know they wouldn’t have given up after enough time of not getting any information they wanted?”

  “How do you know they would?”

  His jaw tightened, and he adopted that preternaturally still posture that might have poked some holes in her determination if she wasn’t so mad.

  “I’ve protected myself and my son for a year. Without you,” she said to Reece. “Without you,” she said, pointing to Shay and Elsie. “I need help, yes, but I don’t need some mysterious group sweeping in and blowing up my life, no matter how nice you all might be. You can’t take away my free will. You can’t tell me what to do. You are not in charge of me.”

  The room went silent. She would have categorized Reece’s silence as tense, at best, but Shay and Elsie weren’t tense so much as...curious. They both gazed at Reece as if they’d never seen him before.

  Lianna didn’t know how to read into that. She supposed it was beside the point anyway. “They now know I know Todd’s real name. But they knew it to begin with, so they want more than that from me.”

  “Elsie is working on finding the real ID for the man who came to your inn this afternoon,” Reece said. Through clenched teeth. He didn’t have his fists bunched, but she felt that kind of tension from him anyway. As if he was ready to physically fight his way through this but was holding himself back.

  “That’s good,” Lianna said, finding the more she observed the bubbling ferocity beneath Reece’s controlled facade, the more controlled she felt. Sort of like when Henry was throwing a tantrum. She wanted to laugh at the comparison, but unlike a child’s tantrum, she didn’t think Reece would handle her laughing in a petulant or dismissive way.

  “There are definitely some blocks. Someone doesn’t want us to know who he really is or who he’s connected to. I’ll be able to unearth it,” Elsie said, with a kind of quiet confidence that helped ease some of Lianna’s fears. “It just might take more time than I’d like.”

  “What happens when you unearth it?” Lianna asked, with none of the snap or demand she’d had earlier. No, she was too tired for that. She was too...fed up with half answers that didn’t actually end what Todd had brought to her doorstep. “You know the name of the group who Todd was potentially working for. But you don’t know what they want from me. We won’t know what they’re after unless we give them some access.”

  “They will get no access to you, and that’s it,” Reece said. His voice was controlled, but nothing else about him was. He shocked her completely when he said no more and just stormed out of the room.

  “Well, that was interesting,” Shay murmured.

  “I was laboring under the assumption Reece was a robot,” Elsie said, sounding awed. “That was not robotic.”

  Both women turned their gazes to her. As if she understood...any of what they were saying or getting at.

  “I...wouldn’t know. I’ve only just met him.”

  “And made quite an impression. Reece has dealt with a lot more complicated, dangerous missions than this,” Shay said.

  “Seriously. He single-handedly saved all those guys in Afghanistan,” Elsie said, though she’d turned back to her computer and was tapping away again. Trying to find the man who’d wanted to check in to her inn.

  “And came out with barely a scratch when he saved that girl from, what was it, ten Sons members?”

  Elsie nodded. “Then he came back and shrugged it off as nothing and asked for the next mission.” Elsie slid a look at Lianna. “And did not storm out of any rooms.”

  “Ever. I’ve been here longer than him. I have never seen him act even a little bit like that.”

  “I don’t know what either of you are getting at,” Lianna said, trying to ignore the odd flutter of...something in her chest.

  “Just observations.” There was some humor in Shay’s expression, but it slowly melted away. “Putting yourself in harm’s way is a dangerous proposition, Lianna. Even with our help. You’re risking your life.”

  Lianna rubbed at her chest, where that nice, if alarming, flutter had turned into a jerky, beating panic. “I don’t want to risk my life. But I don’t want to live in fear. Henry is missing school. If this goes on much longer, he’ll miss baseball. If we have to move again...” She shook her head. “He deserves a childhood. In one place. He deserves more than this. I don’t know how else to give it to him.”

  Shay nodded. “Can you give us some time? We can plan something. Use a team. Protect you, as much as we can.”

  Lianna didn’t understand these people. What they were getting out of it. Why they’d swooped into her life and upended everything. And worse, why she trusted them. “Why? You don’t know me from Adam. I can’t pay you. Why would you help me?”

  “It’s what we do. Protect innocent people.”

  She thought of Reece’s story about his parents, and how his records had backed all that up. Being taken away by the state. No one had protected him growing up. Were they all like that? “Because you were once innocent people who weren’t protected?”

  Shay shared a look with Elsie, then turned back to Lianna. “That’s exactly why,” she said, firmly. Vehemently. Like it wasn’t just the truth, but an oath she’d taken.

  “I’ll take whatever help you can give me,” Lianna said in return. “Whatever protection you can give me. I don’t have a death wish here. I only want it over so I can give my son the life he deserves. I think I have to put myself in a little danger to do that, but I’ll absolutely wait for you guys to mitigate the level of danger I have to step into.”

  Shay’s mouth curved. “Reece’s reaction is starting to make more sense.”

  Lianna blinked, irritated at the heat rushing into her cheeks. She couldn’t think of a thing to say.

  “It’s late,” Shay said, with a gentleness Lianna hadn’t seen from her this whole time. “Why don’t you get some rest? We’ll reconvene in the morning and brainstorm how this is going to work.”

  Lianna didn’t know how she was going to sleep in this strange place, with so much worry and anxiety filling up her mind. How could anyone sleep knowing their life could be in danger? Or even just completely upended—again?

  And if she worried about that, she didn’t have to think about how she felt toward Reece. A stranger. Someone she barely knew but... She’d been foolish once. She’d fallen for Todd, let her heart sweep her away, because she’d chased a stupid emotion that had turned out to be fake. Fabricated.

  She wouldn’t do that again. Not to Henry and not to herself. Maybe she’d come to trust Reece when it came to helping her, but that didn’t mean she could trust this...flutter inside of her. She couldn’t trust it. Wouldn’t.

  But as she walked back to the room she’d be sleeping in, she stopped short at the entrance to the hallway. Reece was pa
cing agitatedly in the hallway outside the door where Henry slept. He looked a little wild, and that should put her off. It should scare her.

  But it didn’t. She wanted to soothe him. She wanted...him. She just needed to work on convincing herself she couldn’t trust those feelings. Not so quickly. Not when her own judgment had already failed her.

  Reece was nothing like Todd, but that didn’t change who she was. The mistakes she’d made. In the end, the only thing that could matter was making sure Henry was safe.

  Forever.

  * * *

  REECE PACED THE hallway outside the room where Henry was fast asleep. He knew he had to get control of his emotions before he spoke to Lianna, but he also knew he had to speak to her tonight before Shay and Elsie ran with any ideas of using Lianna as bait.

  He couldn’t stand the thought of it. It made his insides feel like rock, and like he wanted to punch his way through...well, the wall.

  He hadn’t felt this way in a very long time, and he didn’t revel in the return of that raging storm. In fact, it only made him more unsettled. Which wasn’t productive. At all.

  He sensed movement at the end of the hall and looked up to see Lianna standing there. She stared at him the longest time, some internal conflict going on behind her eyes, before she started toward him.

  He didn’t say anything as she approached. The words just...left him, and he knew he didn’t have the handle on his inner turmoil or his worry to keep a lid on things that needed to stay completely buried.

  “We came to an agreement,” Lianna said coolly. “If you’d stayed, you might have heard it.”

  “If I’d stayed, I would have punched a hole in a wall,” he muttered.

  If she seemed surprised by that response, she didn’t show it. “That’s hardly constructive,” she said, and she sounded like she did when she was scolding Henry.

  It didn’t do a lot for his temper. “I don’t find myself feeling particularly constructive. I don’t find myself...” He sucked in a breath, calling on all his training—as a soldier, as an operative, hell, as a foster kid who couldn’t make trouble without severe consequences—and pushed down his turmoil.

  Unfortunately, that left room for all those other feelings to take hold. Her standing there looking so...put-together, even as he could see the worry around the edges. The way her blue eyes regarded him with a wariness she should have, but he didn’t want.

  Her honey-blond hair had fallen out of its ponytail, and despite her rigid posture, she looked like a woman who’d been through hell. And he wanted...

  God, the things he wanted that didn’t make sense to him. He clutched at his shirt, frustrated and lacking the words to express it. “I don’t know what this is.”

  She blinked, finally showing an emotion that wasn’t haughty disdain. Shock or something like it. Confusion, definitely. She should be confused. He was damn confused himself.

  “What what is?”

  “This...feeling. What I feel for you. I don’t understand it. I can’t say I like it. It’s like...a disease.”

  “I’m a disease?”

  “That isn’t what I meant.”

  She inhaled carefully. “No, I suppose it isn’t.” Her eyebrows knitted together, and she studied him. It made his chest feel too tight, and it made him want to do things. Touch her, for one.

  She was...she was so much better than him. He knew what he was. What he deserved. It sure as hell wasn’t her.

  “Reece...” She trailed off, but just his name sounded tortured. Like she was dealing with at least some of the tension he was. But that was stupid, because she was just worried about Henry. About her life.

  “I suppose the difference between us,” she said after a while, “is I know what I feel, but I can’t trust it.” She took a step toward him. Her fingertips touched his jaw, featherlight and with some trepidation, as if she might dart away at any second.

  He held himself so still he wasn’t even sure he was breathing.

  Her eyes looked directly into his. “You’re a good man,” she said firmly. “Against my will, I can’t help but trust you. It’s myself I don’t trust.”

  She seemed...sad about that, and her fingers didn’t fall off his face. She didn’t step away. She just...looked at him, like if she did it long enough, something would change.

  Maybe he could change it. He could touch her back. He could kiss her. He could change everything. Hadn’t he done that? Over and over again? Change his life in the face of circumstances that shouldn’t have allowed him to change?

  His hand settled on her waist with half a thought to draw her near, even as that insidious voice he’d tried to silence his whole life told him he didn’t have the right. She didn’t step away. She didn’t drop her hand. She sucked in a breath, but she didn’t turn away.

  Without warning, there was the sound of a faint crash, then heavy footsteps, right before a large figure appeared at the end of the hall.

  Reece felt like a guilty kid with a stolen piece of candy as he pulled his hand off Lianna’s waist. He glanced at her and realized she’d gone stiff and pale as her hand dropped from his face.

  “That’s Holden Parker,” he offered, understanding that the appearance of a stumbling, injured man wasn’t exactly the norm for her. “Another operative.” One who was sporting a bloody shirt and an unnaturally uneven gait. “Parker, did you get shot again?”

  Holden flashed a grin as he stumbled past them and toward his room. “A mere flesh wound, friend.”

  Reece frowned. Holden looked pale, and there was way too much blood on his shirt. He also didn’t stick around to introduce himself to Lianna, which wasn’t like Holden at all.

  “I think you should go see if he’s okay,” Lianna said, watching where Holden had gone. “That didn’t look good.”

  “Right.”

  She returned her gaze to him and then smiled. “Good night, Reece,” she said softly, before turning away and disappearing into the room where Henry was asleep.

  Reece blew out a breath. He had no idea what any of that...meant. But he figured that was best. He hadn’t done anything she’d regret, and he could...get a good night’s sleep and shove it all down tomorrow. Focus on the task at hand. Keep her and Henry safe.

  No matter the cost.

  He strode into Holden’s room without knocking. Holden was sitting on his bed, failing at stripping off his own shirt.

  “Did you call Betty?” Reece demanded, already knowing the answer. Holden Parker was an explosives expert. He was impulsive and often got himself injured in the line of duty. He also hated doctors—not Betty specifically, but any medical attention whatsoever.

  “I’m fine,” he grumbled predictably.

  “You were shot. What were you even doing?”

  “Asking the wrong questions of the wrong people, apparently. Someone took offense to me asking questions about the guy who Sabrina tied up earlier. Then I took offense to them trying to ‘escort’ me elsewhere.” Holden flashed a cocky grin. “You should see the other guy.”

  “You need Betty.”

  “I’ll live. Yet again. Who’s the lady?” Holden nodded toward the hallway and waggled his eyebrows.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Reece muttered, knowing Holden was just being Holden and there was no need to get bent out of shape.

  “Dibs. I understand.”

  Offended against his will, Reece shook his head. “There’s no dibs. Have some respect. She’s a mother.”

  “Moms like me,” Holden said with a grin. “And I like them.”

  Reece pulled his phone out of his pocket, pressed Betty’s name.

  “Don’t you—” Holden reached for the phone, but a hiss of pain had him stopping short.

  “Bet? Holden’s here.”

  “Did that moron get shot again?” she asked.

  “He did. L
ooks bad. He couldn’t even stop me from making the phone call.”

  Betty swore softly. “I’ll get my stuff and be there in a few. Don’t let him leave that room.”

  “Got it.” Reece ended the call and shoved his phone back in his pocket again. “If you try to jump out the window, you’re only going to earn yourself a trip to the actual hospital.”

  Holden sneered. “I hate you.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  Holden’s gaze turned sharp and assessing. “Looks like I interrupted a tender moment.”

  Reece shrugged, refusing to give in to Holden’s attempt to irritate him out of the room so he could evade Betty’s impending arrival.

  “She’s the innkeeper, right? The one we’re trying to protect.”

  “She is.”

  “Never seen you get involved in an assignment before.”

  Again, Reece shrugged.

  “I tell you what. You couldn’t pay me to get involved with someone during an assignment. Talk about a disaster waiting to happen.”

  “Good thing I’m not involved, then.”

  Holden snorted. “You’re up to your eyeballs in involvement, Montgomery. I can’t imagine anything worse. Screws with your judgment, your self-preservation instincts. Screws with everything.”

  “Thanks for the pep talk,” Reece muttered. He heard the rattle of the medical cart. “Do I need to strap you down so Betty can look at you, or are you going to be a good boy?”

  Holden laughed. “I bet I could outmaneuver you even with a gunshot wound.”

  Reece raised an eyebrow. “Want to try it?”

  Betty sighed behind him. “Is there anything worse than fragile male egos?”

  Reece moved out of the way so she could push her cart inside.

  “I swear to God, Holden, if you fight me, I’m going to sedate you against your will.”

  There were more grumbles from Holden as Betty got to work. Reece left the room more bothered by the exchange than he’d like to admit.

  Couldn’t pay me to get involved with someone during an assignment. Talk about a disaster waiting to happen.

 

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